'Good will to all men'

Seasons' Greetings and may no one be hanged in 2007.

Penta-ironman

These are images from 'Ironman Western Australia 06' including me and Warnie, the group of us who travelled over from Brisbane (happy to have finished) and me pointing at the dead-calm sea in Geographe Bay which (unlike last year) was also dead-calm on race morning. I was the slowest of our group finishing in 13 hr 52 min and 1 sec! Although 13 min slower than last year (and in much better race conditions!), I was happy with my time. My swim was better, bike about the same and run a bit slower reflecting a little less time for training this year. Ironman number 6???? We will see.

Blue-arsed fly

I've been busy at work and training for Ironman Western Australia in December. I've also had trouble uploading photo's to this site so this is a bit of a test. Here are some photo's of my gandparents place in Brisbane from the '60's. Thanks to Mark for these.

Name that musical.

My son is a T-bird.

Photo's from Texas and Seoul

Here are a jumble of images from my trip to San Antonio via Seoul including street scenes from San Antonio, Austin and Seoul, a sketch from a student in the chemistry department at the University of Texas, San Antonio and a biker-bar where the UTSA chemists drink on a Friday night. I loved both Texas and Seoul, although I was disturbed by the sight of these VERY young pets for sale on a busy street in Seoul.

How are y'all going?

It has been another long period since my last post. I came home from Singapore and soon after departed for texas, via Korea. I loved both Korea (particularly Seoul) and San Antonio, Texas. This was was second visit to Korea and my first to the USA. My first impressions of the latter were (1) wow - these are BIG people and this country is going to have a health crisis around the corner and (2) - related to the first - they drive BIG cars everywhere! I've never met an American I didn't like, and that still holds after 3 weeks in Texas. The natives were very hospitable and I enjoyed bbq's almost every night and boisterous, boozy lunches in front of the World Cup soccer. Despite the socialising, it was still the most productive work trip I have undertaken. I'll try and post some photo's soon.

.....and a few more

These are photo's from my last few days in Singapore - around the University, in Chinatown and from an enjoyable dusk cycle at East Coast Park out along the Bedok pier. Can you tell that I put on 2 kg during this visit?

Photo's from Singapore

I've had some good runs with friends around McRitchie reservoir this week. It is an undulating 11 km and I've been getting around in just under an hour. Other than that, the weekend was spent as a tourist.

Bintan Triathlon

Bintan at sunset........

This is one of the best organised, most scenic races I have done. Bintan is an Indonesian Island 1 hour's ferry ride from Singapore. Tribob.com organised 3 races and I did the 'olympic distance' of a 1500 swim in a clear, warm South China Sea followed by a 40 km bike ride in a torrential thunder storm and a hot, hilly run around a gold course.

I'm not in particularly good shape at present and was looking to do a mediocre 2:35, but the brutal (albeit scenic) run course extended this to 2:54. I also tried, for the first time, putting my cycling shoes on while cycling! I managed one shoe and then gave up, hopped off and put on the other shoe in the more conventional way. Nevertheless, one of my favourite races and I finished 32nd of the 92 40 - 49 y.o. males. I hope I will have the opportunity to do this one again in future.

You can see that the triathlon photo's were taken by a professional, as were the photo's of Bintan after the race. I'll let them speak for themselves.

Post marathon post

Perhaps the best thing about racing is NOT racing (the runner's paradox). I enjoy nothing better than resting after a hard training session, or particularly an Ironman or Marathon. So Friday night, J and I went to a bar in the city called 'Fat Louie's' to watch J's cousin M play in a punk (?) band. It was a good venue and good, hard-core sound. I was old enough to be every other patron's father, but I didn't mind and neither did the (clearly) underage drinkers around me.


Saturday we went to Glenn Innis (central NSW) and froze in the -3C Autumnal nights. It was beautiful to see the leaves changing (a foreign sight to Queenslanders) and on Saturday night we went with a friend to see "Brokeback Mountain" - a marvellous, well made film and rural New South Wales is the perfect setting in which to see it, particularly when it's -3C!

Crossing back into Queensland we visited a large family at Ballendine - a small, wine growing area that borders Girraween National park. Ballendine is cold, beautiful and boasts an impressive pyrimid (I'm not sure why).

Has it really been THAT long since my last post?

Sorry, I've been busy at work and haven't written in awhile. We had to move lab (refurbishments :-( ) and I installed a new piece of equipment which required the assistance of 'Hector the Erector' who specialise in moving large heavy things. None of the (apparently) former 'Hells Angels' who turned up to move my equipment was called 'Hector', but whoever they were, they did a good job and my 1.5 ton high-pressure chemical reactor is in the lab and almost ready to use

Sunday 30 April was the Brisbane Marathon. I hope to have some better photo's for you soon, but at present, I only have this miniscule map of the route. The two loop run started at Southbank, went over the 'Goodwill Bridge', along the river to the Regatta Hotel, back and around the Botanic Gardens, over the Goodwill Bridge again and out along the river to West End, back to Southbank and then all of that all over again. I have been told that the best way to run any distance is at an even pace and I determined to do this on Sunday. I decided my pace would be 5:30 min per km which would give me a 'pb' time of 3hr 52 min. I managed to stick at this pace for 24 km, before it became 6 min per km and then 7 min per km and I finished in a 'pa' (personal average) time of 4 hr 20 min. - oh well - next time. I didn't follow a training programme leading up to this race and was consequently a bit 'under-done'.

Monday 1 May was the Labour Day holiday and I marched with my comrades in the NTEU (National Tertiary Education Union in purple below) from the City to the RNA Show grounds. This is the first time I can remember marching in the May Day rally, although I probably did in my self-righteous youth. There were 35,000 of us in the Brisbane rally which brought out the press and I did an interview with Brisbane radio staion 4BC which was heard by one of my work colleagues.

Arriving at the Show Ground, I was surprised to be met by the Holy Trinity (Kim, Pete and Anna - not shown) who shook hands with the more sycophantic of us (including myself). The Deputy Premier of Queensland, Anna Bligh, ran in the Half Marathon on Sunday and fired the starter's gun for the Brisbane Marathon. I was pleased to be in the march, although I couldn't quite bring myself to join in the obligatory chanting. Come the revolution, I'll be well back from the barricades making lunch and washing up.

Niece's birthday weekend

I had a very enjoyable weekend celebrating my niece's birthday at Marina Mirage, Gold Coast. Breakfast was beyond the dreams of gluttony. Pictured are my sister-in-law, brother, son and mother (and some bloke in a pink shirt - SO last season).

Running around the Brisbane River

Although I haven't been training as compulsively as usual, I have been running around the Brisbane River once or twice a week. Last weekend I joined a group of friends at 5:30 AM at Sounthbank (picture) and we ran along the river to New Farm and back. I estimate that I ran about 29 km and felt pretty good throughout - bode's well for the Brisbane Marathon on 30 April.

I have been training.....

I have been training, but not intensively and have felt a little unmotivated lately. One reason is that the weather has turned cool (well cool for Brisbane) and the thought of a cold pool is very off-putting. I'm thinking of wearing a wetsuit at swimming training this winter. My triathlon coach says that he'd prefer us to come to swimming in a wetsuit, rather than not come at all.

What does this mean?

So what does this tattoo mean? I had it done in Chinatown in Singapore in 2001. I know what I asked for, but I'd like to hear what a chinese speaker interprets it to mean. My polite colleagues at the National University of Singapore used to ask me why I chose THAT symbol!

Mooloolaba Triathlon

Despite the big surf caused by Cyclone Larry, the Mooloolaba triathlon was held on Sunday, although the 1500 m swim was moved from the ocean to the river (thank God!). An open water swim was held the day before, but after the first few groups of swimmers were trashed by the big waves (picture!), the event was stopped. I certainly wasn't looking forward to an ocean swim so the change of venue was welcome news and I has happy with my 32 min swim time (it would have been MUCH longer in pounding surf!).
The swim was followed by a 40 km cycle and again I was happy with my 1hr 13min time on a mostly flat, fast course and I caught up a few of the better swimmers in my 45 - 49 age group. I caught a few more on the undulating 10 km run, although my 49 min time was a bit slow for me which I'm attributing to post-marathon tiredness. My overall time was 2:43 placing me 46 out of the 76 old buggers in my age-group and 32 min behind the fastest of the old buggers. This is a somewhat mediocre time and placing for me, but I was happy with a solid effort and I have a few more Olympic Distance races coming up (Byron and Bintan) in which to go faster.

Ego and super-ego

This COULD be me if I had hair (and why are his eyes 10 times larger than his mouth?). I've been delaying this post waiting on pictures from the Griffith University Aquathon held last Friday, but they haven't arrived so this unidentified anamie character will have to do in place of another picture of me in lycra.

The aquathon started at our Mt Gravatt Campus and involved running for about 3 km through Toohey Forest, swimming 13 lengths of a 25 m swimming pool and then sprinting 800 to the finish. I was the first (and only) over 40 male to finish for which I won a sports store voucher and other goodies. I was not, however, the first over 40 athlete to finish, being comprehensively flogged by the first 'masters' woman (salutary for my ego).

My athletic career was nearly interrupted by a spill from my bike on Saturday. I did my first group ride for awhile with 'Spike'' and was at the front of the 'peleton' heading down a hill when I hit some debris on the road and started to wobble. The instinct to stay upright is strong, however, and I managed to stay in control, although not before the group scattered fearing I would bring other riders down. Overall, I was pleased with my fitness on this ride despite a lack of cycling lately. We rode 95 km to Redcliffe and back and I managed to keep up. I'm doing the Mooloolaba Triathlon on Sunday (cyclones permitting) and it will be interesting to see if I've fully recovered from the marathon.